Blogging Away Debt Our Journeys to a Debt-Free Life

by Tricia

I started working on our net worth for July and I noticed that our credit card debt didn’t go down one penny since the end of June. That couldn’t be right…could it?

You know that feeling of blood rushing through your body when you think you just made a mistake? That was exactly what it was like to see that we didn’t make a credit card payment in July. I quickly logged into our account online and I see a minimum amount due glaring at me. I am thanking my lucky stars that the due date was Friday.

I made a payment so that is fine. This is the card at 0% right now and the last thing I want is to lose that interest rate prematurely. Our checking account isn’t so fine. That payment put us in an overdraft situation if we pay our gas bill on time. I haven’t mailed it yet, so I’m going to pay it a little late this month.

I feel like I am back to the “good ole days” of shuffling around payments because money was so tight. We shouldn’t have to revert back to that. I don’t want to revert back to that! But I have been losing focus the past week or so. This happens every time when life gets too hectic on other fronts. The biggest culprit is usually work and that is the case this time. It takes up so much of my energy (especially when I have to work late) that the last thing I want to do is work on the computer more after work. Unfortunately, that also affects my blogging so that’s why I haven’t been around here on a daily basis lately. Even my participation in our budding business has come to a screeching halt because that is computer-based.

But back to the topic on hand…losing focus can be bad. We almost lost our 0% interest rate. If it wasn’t for me trying to update my already overdue net worth on here – I would have missed that payment. So I thought I would ask all of you for your input…

How do you keep focused on your finances when life is crazy? What tips can you share with others?

by Tricia

Tomorrow is the deadline to enter the FNBO Pay Yourself First Challenge. There’s a bit of money on the line. In fact, the grand prize winner will bring in $13,000 when it’s all said and done.

*sigh*

I’ve been trying to make a video using iMovie, but I am not very creative in the movie-making department. I can make a mean cherry picker and I was able to combine green and purple for the colors for this blog, but that’s about it for creative ideas from me.

We’re also pretty boring when it comes to what we want to save for. There’s no real goal except to have a lovely cushion of cash so we can sleep better at night knowing it is there. Let’s see…if we won the $13K we’d pay off the rest of our debt (about $8K) and that would leave $5K for savings. Add that to the almost $4K in there and we’d have $9K.

I still am not used to the fact we have over $3K in a savings account. I can’t even imagine having close to $10K!

I’m hoping a creative idea will come to me tonight. If not, I guess I will not be entering the contest. There are already some really creative videos there. By the way – have any of you entered the contest? If so, please leave a link to your video in the comments. I’d love to see them!